Lucie Tollon
A historic evening, a significant ceremony, a solemn event. Notre-Dame de Paris has been resurrected. Partly destroyed by a fire in 2019, the famous Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral reopened its doors on Saturday in front of an audience of heads of state and personalities, the culmination of a colossal reconstruction project unprecedented in history from France.
Inside the building, in the heart of Paris, around forty heads of state and government, including the elected president of the United States Donald Trump and the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, crowned heads, but also the billionaire Elon Musk, had taken their seats.
20 Minutes makes you relive that moment.
A few minutes before the reopening ceremony of Notre-Dame de Paris, a small page in history opened: the meeting between Emmanuel Macron, the American president-elect Donald Trump and the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky at the Elysée. After a short interview and a handshake in front of journalists, the three politicians went in procession to the cathedral.
He had announced it, even obliged: the Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral was resurrected five years after the fire. Emmanuel Macron, his wife Brigitte and the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo watched the building rise from its ashes. A suspended moment.
Shortly after 7 p.m., the Archbishop of Paris, Laurent Ulrich, knocked on the door of Notre-Dame Cathedral during a ceremony this Saturday. The doors then finally opened again after five years. The bells rang again.
Nearly forty world leaders were already inside when the religious procession walked down the aisle of Notre-Dame, for the first time since 2019.
Firefighters who saved Notre-Dame from the flames in 2019 and craftsmen who participated in its reconstruction were applauded for several minutes on Saturday, inside the cathedral, during the reopening ceremony of the building.
A huge “THANK YOU” was also projected on the west facade of the cathedral while these 160 firefighters and craftsmen paraded through the aisles of Notre-Dame, acclaimed by numerous heads of state and government and personalities.
A “Thank you!” » illuminated outside the cathedral during the tribute paid to the rescuers, craftsmen and builders of,
In a serious speech, Emmanuel Macron expressed to world leaders, men of the Church and the architects of this reopening, “the gratitude of the French Nation. “We have rediscovered what great nations could do: achieve the impossible,” greeted the French president inside the cathedral.
This evening, Notre-Dame de Paris “came back to us” declared Emmanuel Macron. A first night before his religious consecration this Sunday morning.
Also eventful, this evening, the great organ sounded for the first time since the fire. This 13 meter high and three centuries old instrument had not been directly affected by the flames but its approximately 8,000 pipes, clogged with lead dust, had to be dismantled and cleaned. For several months, craftsmen have been tuning and reharmonizing it.
At 9 p.m., the bells rang again, cheering the end of the ceremony but above all the official reopening of Notre-Dame de Paris, before its consecration on Sunday morning.
Notre-Dame de Paris Cathedral has never been as beautiful as this Saturday evening, for this historic meeting. Magic has given way to fire.
